Dissolution Wave by Cloakroom | Album Review
Cloakroom continues their fantastic modern take on the Shoegaze genre with 2022’s Dissolution Wave.
I have always been a sucker for spacey grungy music. I knew from the first few threads I heard off of a random TikTok video that I would be engrossed by the sound of this project. Cloakroom’s third album, Dissolution Wave, gives the trippy floating vibes of shoegaze with a healthy dose of distortion to really put you solidly in the alt rock realms. The album reminds me vividly of some of Hum’s work from the 90s. The group go the inspiration for the project during lockdown:
“When we got into this lockdown mode [during COVID], we were kind of confined to our homes. Just being in this desolate area, it definitely informed the themes of the record. It influenced what we wrote about. Desolation is something Doyle and I talk about a lot. They’re [the abandoned speedways are] “after people,” you know? It’s the Earth reclaiming its property. I think all those things tie into [Dissolution Wave]. It put Doyle in this post-apocalyptic mindset. The main character is working in this weird Dark Age after culture has died.”
We open the album on the tunneling yet driving sound of “Lost Meaning”. The overdriven guitar rips you forwards through the empty space that the Doyle Martin’s vocals hold. This only occasionally gently halted by the amorphous reverb that allows you to free float for a bit before getting sucked forward again in a colorful explosion of sound. You get a stir crazy feeling from the lines, “One more time around/ Do you hear me buzzing off these castle walls?/ Do you hear me and the echo of it all?/ With no feeling,” that mirrors the realty that many felt while held up and away from family, friends, and the day to day normality. It also works well as an introduction to this post-apocalyptic vibe the group is experimenting with.
“Dissolution Wave” blooms like a laser light show. The clean electric guitar sounds give a warmth of colors (reds, oranges, yellows, and greens) that kaleidoscope through your ears. Only towards the end does this get a bit crunchier. I love the trippy psychedelic sound the band has crafted here. The beginnings of a more astrological space adventure (something that Northern Transmission labels as a space western) start to filter in. The lines, “Flora and the fauna out of places to hide, surface to mine/ Of all the stellar wonders that somebody could like, mеteorites/ In the timе it takes all these falling bodies to light/ I’ll name one after you,” take you to this desolate place where our character is trying to find some closeness that they have been lacking. Again, this struggle with isolation and forced introversion parallels the lock down and separation from others.
Probably the most pop forward track on the album is “A Force at Play”. In many ways it reminds me of some of the work that Soccer Mommy has been putting out on her most recent works (another clear lover of the Shoegaze genre). The band offers some welcomed friction with a little overdrive on the guitar towards the back half of the song.
“It was the first song we wrote for this record… I think maybe that was in the back of our heads, but [we wanted to] create a song [with] the Cloakroom dynamic… We put that song out first because it was accessible, sure, but [also] because it’s foreshadowing what Dissolution Wave is as a whole: the complete dynamic of Cloakroom’s sound. The prettiest things we can write and the darkest things all in one record.”
The Northern Transmission interview describes the song as “… [an] asteroid miner writing songs after a hard day’s work, and then filling a literal void with music to keep the Earth from falling off its axis.” I like the metaphor behind this. The use of music to provide stability in a world that is turned on its side.
We pop in and out of distortion like the explosion of fireworks on “Dottie-back Thrush”. The track asks to bring a lightness/calmness to dull the rage that is boiling underneath, “Do me this simple kindness/ Know this milk and honey magic has to take/ Dulling down the blade/ When my thoughts turn to violence.” All this to try to find the beauty in everything around you.
One of the heaviest songs on the album is “Fear of Being Fixed”. Both the bass and electric guitar give it a colorful tension pulls at you throughout the track, something I attest to constant attack at the one note that punctuates the entire song. You always feel like you’re slogging forward to not quite make it anywhere. I do like the opening lines, “When the Satyr sings or the chickadee/ All the same to me, all the same to me/ And the things I hear, they don’t make me wise/ Hear ’em all the time,” as they display this characters aversion to advice on all levels. Yet, they still hold out for hope that things will change in the end.
“Lambspring” brings to mind more indie rock vibes. The arpeggiated glossy guitar lines in the beginning really bring to mind the dreamy sounds that a band like The Paper Kites have played with. That said, the band keeps a milky otherworldly feel to the sound that keeps it apart from the rest. You really get this feeling of total isolation on this track. The lines, “When the sun sets, get as quiet as you can/ Hear the worms as they turn and I swear you’ll see them glistеn,” really bring to mind the emptiness of the surroundings you are in. This imagery is used to allude to the loneliness one can feel when unable to be around the one’s they care about or potentially even a lost love that still leaves a sting to this day.
“Doubts” is our glittering slow jam. The song sounds like a late evening drive as the cascade of reds, oranges, and pink melt to the cool blues and purples of a near night sky. We continue on the themes of isolation while adding to it the feelings of loss (specifically of love lost). Their hope for the future is starting to burn out. They can’t seem to get back in this person’s good graces. At this point, they are at a crossroads of whether to use this as a gift to start anew or rage at the loss, “There’s just no good way around it/ Maybe I should cherish the gift/ Maybe I should smash the mirror to bits.”
We end out heavy on “Dissembler”. It’s got just enough grit to keep your head bobbing as you lose yourself in the cosmic sound of the bass and guitar work. The lyrics deliver us to this otherworldly planet of where our characters “got used to eating only algae that we grew” and drank “wine we made that turned our fingers blue.” Though the words are cast in sci-fi theatrics, the meaning centers around a relationship that is lost in time. As to dissemble is to conceal one’s feelings, we seem to want to remove these aching feelings of loss and disappointment to the sands of time.
I really enjoyed the sound of this project. It fully got me back to my youth listening to dreamy alt rock in high school. The themes are rather loose giving room for interpretation. I do wish there was a little more glue to the lyrics on the album. As they stand, the lyrics feel a bit more on the lines of stoner rock than more deeper. I’m not completely mad at this as it’s a great album to put on and get totally lost in. The group does a wonderful job creating spacey grungy shoegaze music that will get fans of Spirtualized or Hum totally nostaglic. It’s totally worth a listen if you enjoy the genre or are looking for a milkier form of alt rock. My favorites:
- “Dissolution Wave”
- “Fear of Being Fixed”
- “Doubts”
- “Dissembler”
My overall rating: 6.0 out of 10.
